In small towns, there's a Mom Network
It was easy to tell Mom was mad when she didn't speak to me.
She pulled up to my grandmother's house and honked the horn. I pulled back the corner of a curtain and looked out the window. Mom was sitting in the car, looking at the house, waiting for me to come out.
Mom never honked the horn unless we were late for church, and she always got out of the car. She liked to visit too much not to get out of the car. Something was wrong.
I'd spent Saturday in town like I usually did. Grandma's house was my base camp. I kept a bike in her shed and, after I'd stuffed myself with Dr Pepper and Fig Newtons, I'd hop on my bike and ride to a friend's house to play baseball, swim or hammer nails into a block of wood for no reason.
Did she know?
Mom honked again.
"You'd better go," my grandmother said. "She's waiting."
Yeah, I thought. Waiting to strike.
I realized as I slowly walked out to Mom's 1973 Buick Regal that my grandmother must be in on it. She'd been on the phone about 15 minutes ago, right after I'd come in with bloody knees and a dirty shirt. It only took Mom 15 minutes to drive into town from the farm, so ...
Grandma was in on it.
I thought I knew what "it" was. And I hoped I was wrong.
- - -
We'd just left Hall's Grocery. Randy, Mike and me, each with a candy bar - like we needed the sugar.
"Beat you back to Randy's house," Mike said, sticking the candy bar between his teeth, getting on his bike and shooting out of the gravel parking lot.
Randy hopped on his bike and took off behind Mike.
I'd just unwrapped my Reggie Bar, and it was too round for me to grab with my teeth. I ripped a bite out of it, then clamped the quarter moon-shaped bit in my mouth and took off on my bike, too.
A car horn blared in my ear.
I gripped the brake levers on the handlebars and felt the bike give way beneath me, shooting me into the street. I hit the pavement knees and palms first.
A white van stood over me. I looked up and saw a tire looming over the dust-covered Reggie Bar that had shot out of my mouth.
"What the hell are you doing?" I heard the van driver yell, but I was already up on my bike, peddling as fast as my chubby 10-year-old legs could pump. Blood ran from dirt-caked scrapes on both knees and palms, but I wouldn't know that until later.
- - -
I shut the door slowly as I got into Mom's Buick, afraid any noise might set her off.
As soon as the door clicked shut, she drove off, looking straight ahead and gripping the wheel like it was my neck.
On Saturday, when she picked me up from Grandma's, she always asked if I'd had fun, or if I'd done anything new, or if I met a little girlfriend, or "who'd you play with today? Really? Do you see that house on the corner? His great-grandfather's cousin's sister-in-law lived there in 1952, and she raised bees. Ask him about it."
She drove slowly home, maybe to make me think about whatever it was I wasn't sure I was in trouble for. Or, maybe I was just paranoid. Maybe ...
I couldn't take it anymore.
"I road out into the street without looking both ways, and a van almost hit me," I blurted, like she'd threatened me with a belt, which she never did. "Then I fell and scraped my knees, please don't put Bactine on them."
"I know," She said. "Donny's mom called me. Do you realize you could have been killed?"
Donny's mom? But Donny's mom wasn't there.
I discovered something important that day. There's some kind of Maternal Spy Network in small towns where other kid's moms will rat you out to yours. No matter where you are, no matter what you do, somebody's mom is going see you do it - and they'll tell on you.
Poop.
